The story of the prodigious war, made by the spirits of the invisible world upon the people of New-England, in the year 1692, hath entertain'd a great part of the English world with a just astonishment. And I have met with some strange things, not here to me mentioned, which have made me often think that this inexplicable war might have some of its … [Read more...] about Horrid Sorcerers And Hellish Conjurers

One of my favorite Frontier Partisan artists has recreated a scene I imagined vividly in my youth, when I imbibed the ur-myth of the American Frontier like wine. “On his first long hunt, Daniel Boone amassed a fortune in otter, beaver and deer skins. He was headed back east when Shawnee warriors led by Captain Will Emery surprised him. Captain … [Read more...] about More From The Trapline — September 2019

John Bozeman met a violent end right in the middle of the epic fracas created by the trail he blazed running from Fort Laramie northwest to the Montana goldfields. A little over a year after the December 21, 1866, destruction of Col. William Fetterman’s command — even as the Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho continued their harrying of the Army posts … [Read more...] about The Murder Of John Bozeman

“You recall the time when the Jesus Indians of the Delawares lived near the Americans, and had confidence in their promises of friendship, and thought they were secure, yet the Americans murdered all the men, women, and children, even as they prayed to Jesus?” — Tecumseh to Gen. William Henry Harrison The American Legends Podcast is a … [Read more...] about The Slaughter Of The Jesus Indians

Stumbled across a few shots of a flamboyant Frontier Partisan who played a key role in the fight that sparked the Northwest Rebellion in Saskatchewan, Canada, in 1885:  Gentleman Joe McKay. I wrote of this frontier conflict in a chapter on the great Metis war leader Gabriel Dumont in Warriors of the Wildlands. The Metis of the Canadian … [Read more...] about Gentleman Joe McKay

It is de rigueur in the hipper circles of Americana music to shit on The Eagles at every opportunity. After all, the icon of all that is hip and holy — Gram Parsons — once described The Eagles as “a plastic dry-fuck.” Well, I love Gram Parsons’ music and we are forever in his debt for his introducing Emmylou Harris to the world — but he was a nasty … [Read more...] about Must Be A Certain Kind Of Fool — An Appreciation Of ‘Desperado’

There’s this thing called The Outlander Effect. It refers to the massive impact the Outlander series of books by Diana Gabaldon and the STARZ series based on the novels on the economy and culture of Scotland. Over the past quarter century, the books and show — largely set in the Highlands at the time of the Jacobite Rising of 1745, then moving to … [Read more...] about The Gabaldon Effect

The garrison at Fort Phil Kearny was numbed with shock, grief-striken and terrified. When Col. Henry Carrington led a detail out to recover the 81 bodies from the December 21, 1886, destruction of Captain William Fetterman’s command, he ordered that the women and children be gathered in the powder magazine of the fort. If the Lakota stormed the … [Read more...] about The Bozeman Trail War — Part VII — Endgame

Maybe it was the hat. Or maybe I bore the unmistakable stamp of a man riding an intense history high. When I walked through the door of the Fort Phil Kearny museum and visitors center, the lady on duty locked her radar on me. “So who would you say is most responsible for the Fetterman Disaster?” she queried as soon as I dropped my $5 donation in … [Read more...] about The Bozeman Trail War — Part VI — A Scapegoat And A Crazy Horse